


From Athens

by AHappierYear



Category: Maurice - E. M. Forster
Genre: Clive writes nonsense to Risley, Gen, Greece, greece trip, letter writing, non-linear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-05
Updated: 2019-04-05
Packaged: 2020-01-05 00:20:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18354731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AHappierYear/pseuds/AHappierYear
Summary: Clive writes a decidedly incoherent letter to Risley and reminisces on their time together to try to clear his thoughts after admitting his lack of continued attraction towards Maurice.





	From Athens

**Author's Note:**

> My second fanfic on this site! After finishing this up I realized Clive in the original book was actually probably enrolled at Trinity, not Cambridge; pretend this is intentional. I don't believe Risley has a canon first name, so I christened him Vernon after Vernon Lee, whose work I've been enjoying lately. Enjoy!

The letter was written, but of course, there was more to say, as there always was. Clive thought, a sad acrid taste coating the back of his mouth. He was seated on the outdoor patio area of a charmingly twee Greek coffee house, which he had frequented during his stay in Athens. Relative wealth in the area had kept the sand yellow brickwork streets from becoming too grimy with their usual wear and the lacy wire tables with a coat of fresh paint; everything was stiflingly picturesque and suffocatingly pretty, just as he had imagined it. Wood-scented damp mountain air from the adjacent hills kept one from feeling sick or sleepy even if one really deserved it; the dissonance between Clive’s tumultuous inner monologue and the objective piece of his surroundings leant the streets an uneasy, false feeling.

Sitting on his table was a cooling cup of thick Greek coffee, which he had kept carefully separate from everything else as to not stain it. If he was being honest with himself, he didn’t like it too terribly much; he objected to the overpowering sweetness and coarse dregs of the grounds that stupidly, he thought, weren’t filtered out. Also laid out were a pair of reservoir pens, one a nice, strong black, and the other a calmer blue, which he had diluted over the trip by wetting the tip with water rather than replacing the cartridge, and of course, the letter. 

He had written as plainly as possible, kept it under a page front and back, then folded it crisply, slipping it unceremoniously into its neatly adressed white envelope. Sometimes, at home, he sealed his notes with glue or wax, but it was all too messy to do while travelling, so he had to use a pre-gummed envelope. This was good, he thought. Best to get it over with without any extra flair. 

But there was still more to say! More than a page, more than a couple sparse paragraphs of nothing. Wasn’t it shocking? Isn’t it supposed to be shocking? Or, wasn’t it a long time coming? How long ago had his affection for Maurice died? There was no good answer to this. No good answer to any of it. Intellectually, this was clear to Clive, of course, the fact that his persuasion had changed was a mystery not possible to thoroughly study healthily, sometimes these things just happened. Years, though, those years lost, suddenly, in the span of a small handful of months. How could have it had happened? All he could do was fill his lungs with the heavily flower-perfumed air of the Athens street, close his eyes very tight for a slight second, and then stretch them open. No, he still felt uneasy. Look for a distraction, look to be distracted…

Once the mind has attached express emotion to a topic, especially one with serious implications into the future, it is nearly impossible to re-route one’s thinking to something else, anything else. Clive found this to be true at that moment, as his eyes focussed on a young man chatting vibrantly with a woman carding some wool on the steps of an old rowhouse. The particular way he clicked his consonants and the way he gesticulated in fluid arcs reminded him very strongly of his friend Risley when they had first met. Blast it all! Just one moment, he needed just one moment away from the thought of a life he wouldn’t allow himself- no _ couldn’t _ allow himself- to live any more. Why in the world had he chosen Greece? Alright, something had to put it all to rest. 

Risley, yes, Risley would read a letter about all this mess, Clive could imagine it now. He’d open it while still walking, pull the contents out and hold the envelope with his teeth, unfold it quickly and casually, maybe lean against or a wall or a chair draped in a decidedly decadent fabric, purple velvet, perhaps, or orchid-pink satin. Laugh, yes, he’d laugh when he read the contents, he always thought Clive stuffy and unfun. But he’d write back, and Clive could burn the letter as a symbol- he needed a symbol, yes- a symbol of him severing his connection to that world. 

Risley had thought himself to know better than Clive. But he surely couldn’t have. Famous for his abrasive confidence and absolute self-assurance, Risley was not the type to have thought realistically, really, about these sorts of things. Curse the aesthetes! They were like confused young animals, all awash in the colors of the world without any thought of the predators lurking around the corner. Destruction was the only possible outcome of a life led by pleasure- the universe could not allow balanced peace and consequence-free desire to coexist. They were natural cosmic enemies, chaos and order, sin and salvation. Maurice was sin, he was temptation, and a threat to the order of Clive’s life. Yes, curse the aesthetes! Modern thinking was only a road to corruption.

Clive watched the man at the rowhouse flop down to sit next to the woman and whisper something in her ear with maybe a little too much energy. She laughed quietly, covering her mouth with a dainty, thinly veined hand. Allowing himself to be distracted by this for a second, he appreciated their connection. These people, these saints, had resisted that what, if he were a stronger man, he could have resisted. They had to have felt the same temptation at least once, yes? They were the same as him, he knew this, but they had surpassed him in terms of moral fortitude. He understood this. Where had his proper youthful fear gone, the self-discipline?

Risley- yes, muddler of minds, agent of disarray. How had they discovered each other? What was the root of all this- when had he told someone first? Yes, it was early at his only second semester at Cambridge, Risley and Clive were put together by chance. They met at the help desk at the library, Risley was aimlessly staring into the stacks, Clive was requesting a book. He didn’t remember which one, it was probably some sort of dry essay at that point in his studies, but he did remember being bewildered by the man right next to him.

“Are you looking for something?” Clive asked. He actually had never asked if a student could enter the stacks to look for a book themselves, and had just assumed that it was off limits. He didn’t recognize Risley at the time, but he seemed the right age to be a student and not a librarian, and besides, he wasn’t wearing any identification. The whole way he held himself was alien to Clive, there was a unabashed confident playfulness in the subtle shifting of the feet, the barely perceptible curve of his spine. 

“I’m just thinking,” responded Risley, turning his whole body to face Clive. He was a good head taller than him, and stood with his arms in tight angles hugged close to his chest, making him look quite severe in sum. 

“Good place, to do that, a library,” said Clive. 

“It  _ is _ a nice library you all have got here.”

“Oh, are you not a student? I just assumed-”

“I’m enrolled down at Trinity. It’s  _ fine _ , I’m just here on a visit, I know the Dean.”

“That’s good.”

“It  _ is _ good, thank you for noticing!” Risley laughed a little bit, and then tilted his head just so, with an emotion Clive couldn’t place washing over his face. “Say, I never meet students without being introduced, and here we are! M’name’s Risley, I’ll pretend I’m here on  _ official _ business, I hope you all here don’t mind me wandering around.”

“Doesn’t bother me.”

Clive reverted back to the present and hastily stuffed some bills on the table, just covering the bill, and then roughly pushed his chair out to stand. Instinctively, on his way back to the hotel, he tipped his hat to the man at the rowhouse, who smiled back in kind. Clive only blushed angrily, and wrapped his arms to the chest as he went on his way. The stones reflected the warm Greek sun abrasively well, shining intense heat and soft light up onto his downward face. 

Back at the the hotel, he settled down to correspond with Risley in private. Black pen, fresh paper, curtains closed so that the room was as dark as possible with enough light to allow writing if you squinted. No headaches that way, but it made the whole affair feel suitably dark and a little damp with the humid air; it all was reminiscent of a cave or a deserted stony medieval cathedral. Alright now, what did he want to say?

_ Dear Mr. Vernon Risley, _ that was easy enough, _ Hasn’t it been a while, old friend? _

_ Well, I am writing to you from Greece, a place I know you hold a special affection towards. It is pleasant enough here, the travel is easy and stress-free; it helps that I know the language quite well. This is the reason I am writing you, you see, during my trip my-  _ and he didn’t know how to continue. Risley had known of Clive and Maurice’s union, he encouraged it. It was proving difficult to describe, however; each word or phrase possible held some implication that Clive felt uncomfortable with.  _ My inclination towards my own sex- the same one we used to share- has faded rather suddenly and vehemently. My feelings on this topic are yet embryonic, but since we share a past of healthy conversation on the subject, I thought you might be  _ _ a good person _ _ a reasonable candidate for advice.  _

The first time they had approached the subject together had been sudden and intense for Clive, although Risley clearly hadn’t thought much of it. They were at Risley’s dorm, with Clive brewing some fragrant cardamom tea on a hot plate stolen from the chemists and Risley lazily trying to balance a pencil on the tip of his pointer finger. Risley had an unfortunate habit he had borrowed from the dandy movement of describing moods in terms of flowers or jewels, flouncy feminine things. He had described the atmosphere of that particular afternoon as “violet-esque,” which he refused to elaborate on when pressed. 

“Durham,” Risley said, “I’ve got someone coming over today that I’d like you to meet.” Risley had liked Clive to meet many of his friends before, they were always of the same sort. He thought them overbearing and unsettlingly loud, but they were at least entertainingly strange in a certain peculiar way. They weren’t unpleasant to be around, all in all, but more as creatures to study, or as curiosities, than people Clive really enjoyed. 

“Oh?”

“Yes, he’s  _ wonderful _ \- better than all the others.”

“Sounds fantastic- do you have a strainer?” Then, the door flew open, and a tall man maybe a year older than the two of them, strode in, called “Vernon!” and took Risley in his arms, kissing him.

Now, at the sight of this, Clive nearly jumped right out of his skin. What was all this? He couldn’t hide his disgust, which, as he thought about it, was strange. Didn’t he want this, too? Wasn’t he destined for all this? It wasn’t as though the idea of these connections was completely foreign to him, he had admittedly craved them since an embarrassingly young age, but when faced with the actualization of his desire, especially in such an open context, made him feel displaced in his own skin, as though Risley had suddenly announced he had plans to jump off the roof.

“Oh, you look  _ shocked _ ,” said Risley, drawing back from the other man (Clive hadn’t caught his name). “You’re in college, nineteen or twenty now, and I know you speak  _ perfect  _ Greek, Durham. You should know by now that these things happen.”

Clive screwed up his shoulders. “I am aware of them, Mr. Risley, I just hadn’t expected you to- I don’t know, participate. You seem a good man-”

“I am!” 

“You are, but I guess, well, maybe I am a little shocked.” He hated when this happened, he hated having to confront his inversion head on. It always came out of nowhere, didn’t it? A warning, perhaps, he wanted the world to give him a warning. 

“Funny, Durham, when I first met you-”

It was Clive’s turn to interrupt. “Oh, please, don’t say it.”

“Huh?”

“No, I know what you’re going to say! Tell me, is it so obvious? Is it really?”

“Oh… well, Durham,” said Risley, stepping forward to rest between Clive and the stranger. “If I know what you mean, I did guess when I first met you, but I’m not always right. I’m mostly right- but not always.”

Clive cursed, which he rarely did, and shakily poured himself some tea. “It’s alright. It’s really alright, though, isn’t it?”

“Yes.” came the blunt reply.

“I’ll leave you all to it,” said Clive, he knew what this meant, and pushed out of the room, stealing Risley’s tea cup in the process.

“Bye…!” 

_ I have drafted a letter to send to poor Maurice Hall and elected to also inform you and your group of my transformation. Feel free to write back, know I will read it, but doubt I will respond. It is-  _ he paused to think, his free hand scratching a little hoarse rhythm on the margins of the paper-  _ it is unwise for me to continue communications with  _ _ our _ _ your own sort. I fully intend to marry now and my reputation cannot hold the stain of past interactions of that ilk. I think you a wonderful man, Risley, but you are from a portion of my life thankfully fully gone. Or, it will be, once I send this.  _

Risley found him not two hours afterwards. He asked if Clive wanted to talk about their shared affliction. “I would,” Clive admitted, “I will, but understand I do not have the same swaggering confidence about it that you do.”

“That’s alright. Fine to start somewhere.”

Although it was slow going in the beginning, Clive  _ had _ lived for four years at that point unable to speak about a very large part of his life, and being a perceptive and thoughtful young man, had a lot of ideas on the subject. Risley supplied him with Bloch and Hirschfield, which were far to scientific and finniky for Clive’s liking. He liked to play with numbers fine, balance books and solve physics equations, but having them applied to his condition was disconcerting. While knowing that there were other men like him was comforting in a way, seeing them purely in statistics was alienating and impersonal. “I know we are both that way,” he’d say to Risley, “why do I have to listen to them tell me exactly how many others there are?”

“But look,” Risley said, “ _ look _ , they’ve got the Uranian brain all figured out. Fascinating!” 

“About time someone figured your brain out.”

“Mr. Durham!” 

_ As a note, I have to say that I now do not agree with all of those old authors who told us how our brains functioned and think psychiatry as a discipline far too young to be trusted. Now, I know it all to be untrue, and should think their statistics and their scales are all posh as well. You’d do yourself a favor to reconsider.  _

What Clive really loved, however, was the brashness, the nonchalant easy attitude Risley’s folk had concerning the subject. He soon learned to joke along with the best and brightest among them, and, for the first time in his life, found himself fairly popular. It felt good to allow himself to express his attraction in a jovial, non-judgemental context, although he felt slightly worried about possible advances from others in his social circle, none of which was realized. He questioned Risley about this one night, while they were walking back from some sort of late night whiskey-and-piano party that had gotten particularly heated. Two of the men present had made very blue comments under the influence of heavy drink, and began to act a little more aggressive physically after which Risley had signalled to Clive that it was their time to leave. 

“Your friends- they’re a good laugh,” Clive had remarked. The air was unfathomably cold in that late November way, where it feels as though Earth has never experienced lower temperatures. 

“Yes, that’s why I associate myself with them.”

“They seem to like each other quite a lot.”

“It’s what brought us together, isn’t it?”

“They never approach me.”

Risley stopped. “Do you _ want _ them to?”

“It’s alright. I’m not interested in any of them anyway.”

“Good.”

“How do you mean?”

“Well, Mr. Durham, I saw your discomfort at the more intense expressions of,” another student passed them, so he lowered his voice, “intermediacy, so I privately discouraged  _ pursuing  _ you as a viable option.”

“I appreciate the gesture, but I’d like you to… not continue that in the future.”

“Will do!” Risley kicked a stone into the nearby creek, which caused him to slip on the chilly mud. The two shared a comfortable laugh. 

_ In conclusion, thank you very much, and I mean this earnestly, for your companionship, and know that I mean no ill will. I have now decided it would be best for you to disregard this completely. Thank you. Good-bye. _

_ Regards, _

_ Clive Durham _

No time to reconsider, or he’d worry his brains to mush. Practically incomprehensible letter in the envelope, envelopes in the bag, and he was out on the street, looking for a mailbox before he had even realized it. The setting sun had washed the scenery a pale fuschia painted with long, sharp shadows that made each craggled cobblestone stand out like a rounded mountaintop in the surrounding hills. He sent the letters. They were out of his control now. Best to enjoy the rest of the trip without thinking of them. They’d catch up to him when the world felt fit.  


End file.
